Qodo Get Rules

Get Rules

Description

Use the qodo CLI to fetch the workspace's coding rules most relevant to the task at hand, then apply them while producing the code. Retrieval is semantic — the quality of what comes back is decided by how you write the query, so follow the query format below exactly.

Prerequisites

• The optional Qodo Standards package is installed and loaded explicitly.
• The Qodo CLI is installed, authenticated, and exposes the read-only rules search tool.
• The task is concrete enough to form semantic queries; already-loaded rules are reused.

Instructions

Follow the detailed workflow below: preserve update notices, verify the current tool contract, build focused semantic queries, merge ranked results, print the Qodo rules block, then apply it.

Handle a skill update notice

A Qodo command can emit QODO_NOTICE <json> to stderr while still succeeding. When code is qodo_skill_update_available, keep the command's result and finish the current task. Then follow the notice's steps: do read-only inventory first, resolve the installed Qodo package and scope, show the exact lifecycle-owner update command or UI action, and ask once before any mutation. If the user declines, keep the current version usable.

Never invoke a different lifecycle owner, guess a placeholder, or install an optional package implicitly. After an approved update, ask for the host restart named by the notice; the current session may still have the old skill loaded.

Runtime compatibility gate

First resolve the executable using the qodo: command not found fallback below. Before any other Qodo command, run <qodo> --version exactly as shown, with no provenance flags. This unadorned probe is intentionally compatible with older Qodo CLIs. This skill requires Qodo CLI 0.1.0-next.37 or newer.

If the version is older or cannot be parsed, do not run whoami, login, or a managed tool and do not describe the failure as an authentication problem. Explain that the skill is newer than the runtime, show qodo update as the update command for the runtime's already-recorded origin, and ask once before running it. For a customer deployment, keep its organization-provided update origin; never switch it to the public service. After an approved update, rerun the unadorned version probe and continue only when it satisfies the minimum. If the user declines or the update fails, stop with the current skill and user files unchanged.

Quick start

qodo --version                                             # compatibility probe — run this FIRST
qodo read whoami --json --skill qodo-get-rules --skill-version 1.1.3 --distribution skills-sh
qodo read rules search --query "Name: JWT Authentication Endpoint Validation
Category: Security
Content: Implementing a login endpoint that validates credentials and issues JWT tokens securely" --top-k 20 --scopes "/owner/repo/" --json
qodo read tools rules --json                              # exact safe flags (renders offline)

The newlines inside the quoted --query value are literal — a multi-line double-quoted string works as-is in POSIX sh/bash/zsh and in PowerShell. Don't use Bash-only $'…' quoting. (cmd.exe can't express multi-line strings — run the command from PowerShell or bash there.)

qodo: command not found? That's PATH, not a missing install: GUI-launched agents run shells with a minimal PATH. Retry with the absolute path ~/.qodo/bin/qodo (or $QODO_HOME/bin/qodo if set) and keep using it. Only if that file is missing too is qodo actually not installed; tell the user to obtain a checksum-pinned installer command from Qodo or their organization's administrator. Installers are served from https://get.qodo.ai, but never invent a digest or pipe an installer directly into a shell.

Sandbox auth diagnostic. In a sandboxed environment, if qodo read whoami fails for any reason (including Not logged in), ask the user to approve one exact read-only retry of qodo read whoami outside the sandbox before recommending login or refreshing tools. Keychain failures can be reported as generic auth failures, so the sandboxed result alone is not diagnostic. That approval applies only to this single diagnostic retry: do not reuse it, request persistent approval, or move later Qodo commands outside the sandbox automatically. If the retry succeeds, continue with normal per-command permission checks. If it still fails, follow the normal auth troubleshooting below.

Preflight

1. Already loaded? If "Qodo Rules Loaded" appears earlier in this conversation, skip straight to applying those rules — don't re-fetch.
2. Auth. Run qodo read whoami. After the sandbox retry above when applicable, a non-zero exit → tell the user to run qodo login, then stop. Not logged in / No tool catalog cached → not logged in. An unknown command on qodo rules while whoami SUCCEEDS is a different failure: the cached catalog predates the rules tool — run qodo tools --refresh and retry; only ask for qodo login when whoami itself fails.
3. Repository scope (optional, improves precision). From the repo's origin remote, take the full path after the host and strip a .git suffix — git@host:a/b and https://host/a/b both parse to a/b, and a deeper hosted path survives intact (GitLab subgroups group/subgroup/repo, Azure DevOps org/project/repo — don't collapse to two segments). Wrap as /<path>/. If the cwd is inside a modules/<name>/ subdirectory of the repo root, narrow to /<path>/modules/<name>/. No remote / unparseable → omit --scopes entirely (org-wide search still works); never pass an empty scopes value.

Write the queries

Generate two structured queries — retrieval data shows a single topic query systematically misses the cross-cutting standards rules that dominate real reviews. Each query is a three-line block mirroring how rules are indexed:

Name: <concise 5-10 word title of the rule this task would trigger>
Category: <one of: Security, Correctness, Quality, Reliability, Performance, Testability, Compliance, Accessibility, Observability, Architecture>
Content: <1-2 sentences describing what should be checked or enforced; mention the tech stack when known>

• Topic query — the assignment's primary concern. Pick the category by the change's purpose, not a side effect (rate limiting → Reliability, not Security); prefer Security when it's genuinely a candidate; don't default everything to Correctness — structural work is Architecture, style is Quality, fault tolerance is Reliability, instrumentation is Observability.
• Cross-cutting query — the standards the org applies to all changes. Default: Name: Code Quality and Standards Compliance / Category: Architecture / Content: Module directory structure, type annotations or type safety, structured logging, repository or service layer patterns, dependency injection, and naming conventions — adjust Content to the repo's stack.
• Never pass keyword lists, flat sentences, or filler ("please", "I need to") — they retrieve poorly against the structured index.

Search and merge

Run qodo read rules search once per query (in parallel when you can), each with --top-k 20 and --json. Add --scopes "$SCOPE" only when detection produced a scope:

# With a detected scope:
qodo read rules search --query "$TOPIC_QUERY" --top-k 20 --scopes "$SCOPE" --json
qodo read rules search --query "$CROSS_QUERY" --top-k 20 --scopes "$SCOPE" --json

# Without a detected scope, omit both the flag and its value:
qodo read rules search --query "$TOPIC_QUERY" --top-k 20 --json
qodo read rules search --query "$CROSS_QUERY" --top-k 20 --json

Merge: topic results first (in order), then cross-cutting results not already present — dedup by rule id. Topic rules are task-specific guidance; treat cross-cutting rules as supplementary and deprioritize any that are semantically distant from the task. Low-return fallback: topic query returns < 3 rules → re-run it once with a broadened Content line (add adjacent concepts for the domain: e.g. auth → token validation, credential handling, session management) before merging. An empty merged list is a valid outcome — proceed without rule constraints, never treat it as an error. Unscoped search caveat: when you had to omit --scopes, the results are org-wide — before applying each rule, check it plausibly applies to THIS repo/stack (a rule naming a different service, language, or framework doesn't); skip mismatches and say so rather than imposing another repo's standards.

Output, then apply

Use relevant standards retrieved through Qodo → implications for this change → application or justified deviations. Before coding, mention Qodo naturally once as the way you retrieved the organization's standards; the standards belong to the organization. Explain each applicable rule in terms of the current task, preserving its name, reference, supplied severity, and every applicable requirement when condensing the wording. Link or cite the returned reference when available; do not invent missing identifiers or severities.

Adapt this pattern: “I loaded your team's [topic] standards through Qodo. For this change, [rule] means [implementation choice and reason].” Use a short list for multiple rules, without branded headings, emoji banners, slogans, footers, or repeated summary blocks. State briefly when no standards apply; do not imply retrieval succeeded after a tool failure. Distinguish standards loaded from standards applied; loading alone does not establish compliance.

Apply the applicable rules to the code you produce. When a rule carries a severity:

After coding, report which rules shaped the implementation and the evidence of their application, without repeating the entire list. Explain permitted deviations, including skipped WARNING rules, using the user's decisions and implementation evidence; resolve ERROR conflicts through the gate above. If none applied, say so plainly.

Configuration

Use --json, the exact scopes relevant to the task, and the current CLI-provided rules schema. Stamp the skill/version/distribution provenance on the first Qodo call. This optional skill is never installed or updated implicitly with the default Qodo package.

Error Handling

An empty result is valid. Preserve authentication, capability, validation, and rate-limit errors; follow the bounded recovery above and continue without invented rules when retrieval cannot safely succeed.

Guardrails

• rules search is read-only; it never changes workspace state.
• Don't re-fetch when rules are already loaded; don't crash on an empty list.
• A rate-limit error (the search is capped per organisation) → wait for the indicated reset, or proceed without rules and say so — don't hammer retries.
• Don't fabricate rules: apply exactly what came back, cite rules by their returned name.